SI: Types of conformity and explanations for conformity

Question 1

What is compliance?

Answer 1

• Compliance is the lowest level of conformity.
• Here a person changes their public behaviour, the way they act, but not their private beliefs.
• This is usually a short-term change and is often the result of normative social influence.

Question 2

What does compliance not result in a change in?

Answer 2

Doesn’t result in a change in a person’s underlying attitude, only in the views and behaviours that they express in public!!

Question 3

What is Internalisation?

What are individuals encourage to do when exposed to the views of other members of a group?

Answer 3

Internalisation is the deepest level of conformity.

Here a person changes their public behaviour and their private beliefs. This is usually a long-term change and often the result of informational social influence (ISI)

Question 4

Internalisation

• Close examination of a groups position may do what?
• When is this particularly likely?
• What can this result in?

Answer 4

• May convince the individual that they are wrong and the group is right.
• Particularly likely if the group is generally trustworthy in their views and the individual has tended to go along with them on previous occassions.
• Can lead to acceptance of the group’s point of view, both publicly and privately.

Question 5

What level of conformity is identification and what is it?

Answer 5

• Identification is the middle level of conformity.
• Here a person changes their public behaviour and their private beliefs, but only while they are in the presence of the group!

Question 6

What elements does identification have in it?

Answer 6

Both elements of compliance and internalisation!

Question 7

How does identification have elements of both compliance and internalisation?

Answer 7

As the individual accepts the attitudes and behaviours they are adopting as right and true (internalisation) but the purpose of adopting them is to be accepted as a member of the group (compliance)!

Question 8

Give an example of identification.

Answer 8

A child might start smoking because “that’s what cool kids do” and they want to be seen as the “cool kid”.

Question 9

What is the difference between complying and conforming?

Answer 9

• Each type of conformity has a different set of motivating conditions that lead to a conforming response.
• e.g. If an individuals prime motivation is to fit in with the rest of the group, they may comply rather than internalise the group’s position on a particular issue.
• Alternatively- if the primary motivation is to find the most appropriate way of responding in a particular situation, then internalising the group position may be seen as the most credible way of achieving this.

Question 10

Is identification a long/ short term change?

Answer 10

Short term!

Question 11

What social influence does identification result in?

Answer 11

Normative social influence.

Question 12

Give a real life example of identification.

Answer 12

A person may decide to become a vegetarian because all of his new flat mates are vegetarian. However, whenever he walks past a MacDonald’s he can’t resist a Big Mac and when he is away from his flat mates he still eats meat.

Question 13

When does identification take place?

Answer 13

Identification takes place we are surrounded by a particular group; we change our private beliefs while in the presence of the group and not permanently.

Question 14

What is usually a result of informational social influence?

Answer 14

Internalisation

Question 15

Give an example of internalisation.

Answer 15

If an individual is influenced by a group of Buddhists and converts to this faith, then their new religious way of life will continue without the presence of the group and they have internalised this belief.

Question 16

What is the lowest level of conformity?

Answer 16

Compliance

Question 17

Give an example of compliance

Answer 17

You might say that you like pop music because many other people in your class like pop music and you wish to fit in, however privately you dislike this style of music.

Question 18

What is normative social influence?

Answer 18

Where a person conforms in order to be accepted and belong to a group. They do this because it is socially rewarding and/or to avoid social rejection (e.g. ridicule for not ‘fitting in’).

Question 19

What important condition for normative social influence must occur?

What happens when this is the case?

Answer 19

• The individual must believe they are under surveillance by the group.
• When this is the case, people tend to conform to the majority position in public but do not necessarily internalise this view as it does not carry over into private settings nor does it endure over time (Nail, 1986)

Question 20

What is informational social influence?

Answer 20

Informational Social Influence is where a person conforms to gain knowledge, or because they believe that someone else is ‘right’.

Question 21

When does informational social influence occur?

Answer 21

• Occurs when an individual accepts information from others as evidence about reality.
• As well as having a need to be accepted, human beings also have a need to be confident that their perceptions and beliefs are correct

Question 22

When is informational social influence more likely?

What happens as a result?

Answer 22

• Ambiguous situation (i.e. the right course of action is not clear) or where others are experts (i.e. we believe that others have more knowledge than we have.)
• The individual changes both public and private attitudes and behaviour- this is an example of internalisation.

Question 23

Give positive and negative discussion point for types and explanations of conformity:

Answer 23

+ Research support for normative influence

+ Research support for informational influence

• Normative influence may not always be detected.

Question 24

Smokers and energy conservation.

Write a PEEL paragraph discussing the research support for normative influence:

Answer 24

P - Research support.

E - Research (2003) found that adolescents exposed to simple message that majority of their age peers did not smoke were less likely to take up smoking as a result.

E - Later research (2008) found that hotel guests exposed to normative message that 75% of guests reused their towels each day (indication of energy conservation behaviour) reduced own towel use by 25%.

L - Studies demonstrate the power of NI and show the ecological validity of the idea. However, may not have population validity as these studies only done in US.

Question 25

# African Americans and politics. Write a PEEL paragraph discussing the **research support for informational influence:**

Answer 25

**P -** Research support. **E -** Research (1996) found that ppts exposed to negative information about African Americans (were lead to beleive this view was the majority) later reporrted more negative attitudes toward black individuals. **E -** Research (2007) also found that informational social influence can shape political opinions. In the study, ppts saw what was supposedly the reaction of their fellow ppts on screen during a presidential debate - produced large shifts in their judgement of the candidate's performance. **L -** Shows importance of informational influence in shaping behvaiour, and shows ecological validity.

Question 26

# Energy conservation Write a PEEL paragraph discussing how **normative influence may not be detected.**

Answer 26

**P -** Criticism is that NI may not always be detected. **E -** NI can have a powerful effect on behaviour, but an individual may not always recognise the behaviour of others as a causal factor in their own behaviour. **E -** Research (2008) investigated whether people detected NI on their energy conservation behaviour. When asked what facotrs had influenced them, people believed that the behaviour of neighbours had least impact on their decision, but results showed that it had the strongest impact. **L -** Suggests people may rely on beliefs about what **should** motivate their behaviour, and so under-detect the impact of NI.